EMS Field Guides Helpful?

[bgm]

I’m a new EMT basic; did any of you carry field guides with you when first starting out? I’ve considered purchasing either the Informed Basic and Intermediate version or the ALS version. For those of you who have field guides do you find them useful for reviewing on your way to a call or reviewing at home?

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[pseudoknot]

Yeah, they're useful. More so when starting out but there are always little details you can forget if you rarely use them. I still have the ALS field guide on my iPhone.

 

[Lawsonc]

If your talking about the Informed versions the BLS ones are "ok" the ALS ones will be of little use to you as a BLS provider. Even as an ALS provider there are plenty of mistakes in those flip books and the dosages are "interesting" to say the least. If you actually followed some of the dosages in those flip books you'd have some explaining to do. I don't remember what version it was, or the exact dosage but the EPI IV dosage for anaphylaxis would have killed the patient.

 

[bgm]

Yes, I’m talking about the Informed versions. I ended up buying the Basic & Intermediate BLS version. The ALS version was a bit overwhelming and didn’t seem like it would be useful for me at my level.



Lawsonc, thanks for the heads up! I’ll definitely take what I read with a grain of salt and cross reference information with my textbook.

 

[Julyjoe88]

If your talking about the Informed versions the BLS ones are "ok" the ALS ones will be of little use to you as a BLS provider. Even as an ALS provider there are plenty of mistakes in those flip books and the dosages are "interesting" to say the least. If you actually followed some of the dosages in those flip books you'd have some explaining to do. I don't remember what version it was, or the exact dosage but the EPI IV dosage for anaphylaxis would have killed the patient.

EPIC Proofreading FAIL! even though we laugh the unfortunate part is some people have **** memories and actually use them religiously. Thank god for a photographic memory

 

[EMS5]

i bought BLS when i first got my emt, als a year or so later, and now have them both on my iphone... full of little bits of information that might come in useful sometime... how many times have i actually whipped them out on a call? maybe twice

 

[joeDO2]

i think most people find that they don't use the guides on calls. i found it helpful to put the really important info on a 1-pager....much easier, quicker, and discrete reference for use during calls.

 

[fiznat]

I never really used the EMS guides, but I did carry a little drug reference which I used all the time. I can see how a sold BLS guide would be helpful for someone just starting out, though.

You should never be afraid to look something up if you don't know it!

 

[KD1655]

I think that this type of guide is invaluable for one very important reason...the medication section. This section lists the spelling and usage for several hundred common meds. Consider the cases where your patient is aphasic or altered so you can't perform a proper history and assessment. However, if you have the patient's meds, you can use the guide to see what they are commonly prescribed for, thus giving you a better idea of the patient's history. I used to carry around the ALS field guide but nowi have it right on my iPhone, which is so much more convenient. An app called iTriage is also pretty great.